Caroline Guibet,CNRS – Centre Maurice Halbwachs(1)

Javier Romañach Cabrero,Foro de Vida Independient

ABSTRACT

Contemporary moral philosophy has different approaches to provide justice and equality togroups that are traditionally discriminated on the grounds of gender, religion, age, sexualorientation, etc. On the other hand, functionally diverse (disabled) people have had a parallelapproach to their discrimination, excluded from mainstream diversities. Including functionaldiversity and the diversity model in modern recognition and redistribution theories, as anotherhuman diversity, provides an extended ethical approach: diversity ethics. This general frameworkalso includes other fundamental ideas for equality such as human fragility, social domination logics,self-respect and auto-recognition. Diversity ethics provides sound foundations to defend justice andequality for all human diversities and an alternative to other approaches that broaden the moralcommunity, excluding some humans, like Peter Singer’s ethics.

KEYWORDS

Diversity, moral community, justice, equality, recognition, redistribution, self-respect, dignity,functional diversity, disability, capabilities, Peter Singer,

RESUMEN

La filosofía contemporánea moral tiene diferentes enfoques para proporcionar justicia e igualdada los grupos tradicionalmente discriminados por razón de género, religión, edad, orientación sexual,etc. Por otra parte, las personas con diversidad funcional (discapacidad) han tenido un enfoqueparalelo a su discriminación, y han sido excluidas de las aproximaciones generales a la diversidad.

La inclusión de la diversidad funcional y el modelo de la diversidad en las teorías modernas delreconocimiento y la redistribución, como otra diversidad humana más, genera un enfoque éticoampliado: las éticas de la diversidad. Este marco general también incorpora otras ideasfundamentales para la igualdad, como la fragilidad humana, la lógica social de la dominación, laautoestima y el auto-reconocimiento. Las éticas de la diversidad proporcionan fundamentos sólidospara defender la justicia y la igualdad de todas las diversidades humanas y una alternativa a otrosenfoques que amplían la comunidad moral, excluyendo a algunos seres humanos, como la ética dePeter Singer.

PALABRAS CLAVE

Diversidad, comunidad moral, justicia, igualdad, reconocimiento, redistribución, autoestima,dignidad, diversidad funcional, discapacidad, capacidades, Peter Singer.

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1. Introduction

Societies have been coping with human diversity for centuries, and have developed moralfoundations to provide different people or groups of people with equality in rights and treatment,specially during the past 50 years, in which several social movements have raised their voiceagainst discrimination demanding equality, and several human rights conventions have beenapproved to protect children, woman, migrants, indigenous, functional diverse(2) (disabled) people…

These moral approaches have been incorporating all human, and even non human diversities, andhave sometimes divergent conclusions and proposals.In this text we will try to provide a new proposal, based on recognition and redistributiontheories, that will include the last part of diversity to join the equality struggle: functional diversity,most known as disability. Some authors have developed interesting ideas and foundations in thatfield that could provide a wider range of ideas to face fields as human fragility, auto-recognition ofdiversity and bioethics.

In this proposal diversity ethics is explained and structured, and it will be used to overcomeethical approaches oriented to include non humans in the moral community, excluding somehumans that are part of human diversity: Peter Singers’ ethics.

Peter Singer presented as a major philosophical innovation his apprehension and his justificationof what we should understand today as the ethical pertinent limits of the moral community. Heproposes an extension towards the animal species. Indeed, Peter Singer takes as a starting point thepremise that traditionally humanists have drawn the line between animals and human beings,developing a speciesism that has been disrespectful with animals. His position, at least aninnovation in philosophy, is to include non-human beings in the moral community and excludecertain entities previously considered as part of it, such as “embryos, fetus or comatose individual”.

This new drawing of moral community boundaries, in which we would have duties, would allowdealing with ethical dilemmas, in particular in the medical field, bypassing our Judeo-Christianheritage, making us sensitive to the respect of human life at any development level it is considered.

It is indeed about breaking with the so-called doctrine of the sanctity of human life. The perspectiveoffered by Singer could be an attractive way to solve some of the moral dilemmas, particularlythose raised by new medical technologies.

In this text, we will show, first, that diversity ethics is a more robust extension of the limits ofmoral community than the one Singer wishes to sustain. Second, we will show the limits andinherent contradictions in the approach advocated by Singer, placing ourselves in the same point ofview he does, e.g. adopting a pragmatic and consequentialist approach. Finally bioethical positionsbased on diversity ethics will be described.

2. Issues on diversity and humanity

Humanity is conformed by diversity; in the same way nature is full of diversity(3). There is almostno human being genetically equal to another, with the rare exception of some twins. In thebiological sense there are different races, different genders, different abilities and ways offunctioning, sexual orientations, and a human being is different in different ages, etc.

In a social sense, that is, as a consequence of the social construction through history, some otherdifferences have been built between groups of human beings: religion, culture, language, country ofbirth, wealth, class, etc.

The first group of diversities is inherent to humanity, and the second is inherent to socialdevelopment in different parts of the planet.

Both types of diversities have historically led to inequality, fear, slavery, injustice,discrimination, wars and oppression, as diversity has never been fully accepted in societies throughhistory. But, fear of diversity can have, despite human social behaviour roots, also philosophicalroots: “Political theorist Arlene Saxonhouse (1992) traces the fear of diversity in Western thought tothe pre-Socratics.” (Jakobsen, 1998, 4).

3. Ethics and diversity

Rousseau was the precursor of the efforts that have been developed since the Enlightenment,back in the XVIIIth century to outline injustice, facing the fact that inequality, and thereforediversity, exists in human nature but needs not lead to social inequality in access to justice andfreedom.

“…instead of destroying natural inequality, the fundamental compact substitutes, forsuch physical inequality as nature may have set up between men, an equality that is moraland legitimate, and that men, who may be unequal in strength or intelligence, become everyone equal by convention and legal right.” (Rousseau, 1762, chapter 9).

However, it was mainly in the XXth and XXIst century when different types of human diversityhave been approached by different authors, in search of an ethic foundation that would providejustice, equality and freedom to society. In the past, “the promise of enlightenment ethics was thatconflict, specifically the interreligious conflict sparked by the Reformation, could be resolved whilemaintaining universal respect for diversity. The light of reason, a reason supposedly universal to allhumanity, was to fulfil this promise. Thus, reason was thought to provide the key to maintaining aunified moral framework which could both respect and contain diversity.” (Jakobsen, 1998, 4).

Unfortunately, the interreligious conflict remained, and remains even today, and justice did notarrive to different groups, such as women or people from different race, functionally diverse(disabled) people, etc. These groups started, in different stages of history, their own search forethical grounds that could bring justice and equality to their people and philosophical background totheir political struggles.

Unfortunately, these approaches have always been developed to provide rational and politicalbasis orientated to a determined discriminated and/or oppressed group. Usually these groups wouldignore, both in the political and in the ethical field, the rest of diversities within society, and eventhe rest of diversities within the group, reproducing a uniform simple group pattern, ignoring theirown complexity.(4)

In that way, concerning feminism:

“The past several decades have seen repeated challenges to dominative feminist theoriesand practices which would deny the diversity and complexity of those women who aresubject of feminist movement(s). Women of color, lesbians, poor and working-class women,Jewish women, "Third World women," sex radicals, disabled woman… (this list can neverbe completed) have repeatedly challenged theoretical and political practices which wouldnarrow the focus of feminism and reinscribe social structural limitations along the lines ofrace, sexuality, class, religion, ability… (Beck 1982, Moraga and Anzaldúa 1981, Lorde1984, Samis 1987, Zandy 1990, Mohanty et al. 1991, Eiesland 1994).” (Jakobsen, 1998, 1).

Centuries after the Enlightment, efforts have also been developed to bring together the differentreligious approaches. “In the last decade, there have been a number of interesting attempts toformulate a global ethic. These attempts were initiated by ecumenical religious leaders, but havesubsequently made their way into more general discourse, especially with the people within theUnited Nations.” (Struhl, 2006, 13). In this effort an attempt was made to join cultural, race andreligious diversities. The result of this effort is the “Declaration toward a Global Ethic”, whoseprinciples are:

I. No new global order without a new global ethic

II. A fundamental demand: Every human being must be treated humanely

III. Irrevocable directives

1. Commitment to a Culture of Non-violence and Respect for Life

2. Commitment to a Culture of Solidarity and a Just Economic Order

3. Commitment to a Culture of Tolerance and a Life of Truthfulness

4. Commitment to a Culture of Equal Rights and Partnership Between Men and Women

IV. Transformation of Consciousness”. (Global Ethic Foundation, 1993).

But, as it can be observed by prior references and ideas, a part of human diversity has usuallybeen left out: functional diversity. Even though it is clearly “one of many areas in which trueequality requires not identical treatment, but rather differential treatment in order to accommodatedifferential social needs”. (Kymlicka, 1992, 113).

As another human diversity in struggle for equality, during the last decades, theoretical work hasbeen developed around this group, especially by British sociologists like Colin Barnes, Geof Mercerand Tom Shakespeare(5), and by moral philosophers such as Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum.

Despite these theoretical efforts, insufficient attention has been devoted to functional diversitycompared to other minorities such as women or religious minorities, and is still not considered as apart of human diversity issues in most fields, probably on the grounds of a quite simple issue: it’sbeen studied and named as an ability issue, weakly related to human diversity, as the “disability”word clearly indicates.

Only since 2006, in Spain and mostly in Spanish, this issue has had a clear diversity approachwith what is called the diversity model or approach. This model has been developed in two books anseveral articles related to different fields such as anthropology, sociology, bioethics, social work,law, moral and science philosophy, feminism, etc. by different authors from Spain and Argentina,like Miguel Ferreira, Mario Toboso, Soledad Arnau, Francisco Guzmán, Agustina Palacios,Carolina Ferrante, Manuel Lobato, Javier Romañach, Antonio Iañez, etc.

3.1 Functional diversity (disability) and the diversity approach. A choice for our futuresociety.

Functional diversity activists have turned to bioethics in search of theoretical models based onclear rational grounds that would provide answers to bioethical challenges around functionaldiversity. Those activists also know that “the best examples of debates about moral issues that are inneed of clarification and rigor that a philosopher can provide occur in the field of medical ethics”(Singer, 2002, 68).

The result of this activity had as an outcome the diversity model or approach. This approach wasused to establish bioethics positions on issues related to the functional diversity in a second book:“Bioethics at the other side of the looking glass”.(6)

The diversity model is an extension or evolution of the social model of disability. The socialmodel(7) was based on US Independent Living movement’s ideas (Shapiro, 1994), can be traced toMichael Oliver (1983) and was – and keeps being – developed by British sociologists like ColinBarnes, Geof Mercer and Tom Shakespeare (Barnes, Mercer, Shakespeare, 1999).

As it had happened before, the new model is also based in “…the problem of obligations to ourfuture generations, it undermined the assumption that a moral community can consist only ofmembers who are in one time or era” (Singer, 2002, 130).

Knowing that nowadays society discriminates on the grounds of functional diversity (Palaciosand Romañach, 2006, 55-99), the model states that a choice has to made concerning the kind ofsociety we want to have in the future: “…it’s a task projected to give the same value to all humanbeings that will exist in it [the world] in the future” (Romañach, 2009, 59). Do we want a futurenon-discriminatory society in which every individual no matter how capable, or smart, orproductive, or skilled, or able to run and walk able to speak, or able to hear, etc. has a chance to liveand enjoy life at any age? Or do we want a discriminatory society in which only people who areuseful, capable, smart, skilled, with good sight and hearing, etc. will be welcome and allowed tolive and enjoy what society provides?

The way we and our descendents will live in the future, depends on how we see each othertoday. It depends on the concept we have of what a human being is today, and if we want to selector not the human beings that will be allowed to join us in the future. It also depends on whether wewant to be welcome in our society as we grow old or have an accident.

The diversity model makes a clear choice: actions must be taken today in order to have a futuresociety in which every human being will be welcome and has a chance to enjoy what life in societycan provide. And enjoying that life means providing equal opportunities to everyone, so we maylive the life we want to live, regardless of our physical condition, in the absence of arbitraryexternal social restrictions.

This clear choice is not present in prior approaches, because functional diversity has never beenconsidered a part of diversity in moral philosophy, as all attempts to include it (Nussbaum, Sen)where done without the certainty that functional diversity is inherent to humanity and is not amedical, but a social issue.

In a first approach, this might be seen as a limited struggle of a few individuals(8) who want tostop being discriminated and have equal opportunities in an oppressive society which nowadays isnot constructed to fully accept human diversity.

As an example, accessibility to the environment and buildings in modern developed countries isseen as a demand of the approximately 2% of the population who actually use wheelchairs. But thediversity approach provides a different way to perceive the same reality. In developed countries,100% of the babies are carried around in strollers and there is an important chance that anyone intheir 20s today will be using a wheelchair if he or she reaches the age of 90.

Considering it from a strictly utilitarian point of view, making the environment accessible willtherefore increase the level of happiness and comfort to 100% of the population (not only thebabies, but their parents and relatives and anyone who at the end of the life, or sometime beforethat, will have to use wheelchairs during a certain period or permanently to move around). That is tosay that, accepting that people who cannot walk are an equal part of society and have the samedignity, and providing solutions to this reality, will increase the level of happiness(9), as it can createthe most good for each person (see Roberts, 2002).

This obvious approach has not been addressed before, because inequality has been establishedconcerning functional diversity on the grounds of “ability”, focusing on functional diverse people’sabilities or capabilities (see Toboso and Guzmán, 2009). This focus on ability has been thetraditional moral approach to functional diversity, and always left out a group of people “who wethink have no abilities, or those whose abilities were never promoted” (Palacios and Romañach,2006, 97); and discriminating that group of people made traditional models insufficient for a solidtheoretical model that could be used in bioethical issues. This focus has supported different moralapproaches like Nussbaum’s Capabilities approach (2006) or Peter Singer’s ethics (2002).

The diversity approach rejects ability as a centerpiece for a philosophical approach to functionaldiversity. Dignity(10)is the main founding of the diversity model or approach, and dignity is dividedinto two branches or foundations: intrinsic dignity and extrinsic dignity. The first is related to theequal value of every human life and the second is related to equal rights for everyone. Nowadayssociety provides neither the same intrinsic dignity nor the same extrinsic dignity to functionallydiverse people. Therefore, it becomes necessary to develop new theoretical approaches thatintroduce in the bioethics debate a full support of intrinsic dignity for people who are discriminatedon the on the grounds of their functional diversity.” (see Romañach et al. 2009).

The diversity model demands a new bioethical approach that includes the voice of functionallydiverse people(11) considering their own reality and experience of life. The goal of the model is togrant that the bioethical community will understand that functionally diverse people are not humanbeings that suffer for being different, but for being systematically discriminated or ignored due totheir difference, and by the fact that their lives have been, and still are, systematically undervalued.

The diversity model has been extended taking in consideration critic sociological proposals ofdiscrimination mechanisms, through which discrimination takes effect in functionally diversepeople daily life (mechanisms based on bio-political power techniques, on medical normalization ofthe body(12). It also considers the imposition on practices of a habitus (Bourdieu, 1997), oriented bynormalization.

Consequently, and as needed for any social evolution, the task of working deeper in that analysisbecomes necessary in order to break domination logics (domination imposed through body,regulation, classification and submission) and to provide theoretical tools in an alternative liberatingway (Romañach et al., 2009).

From this point of view, this paper is an extension of the diversity model, in order to cover, andmake it compatible with, or included in, other moral philosophy proposals.

This humanist approach was constructed after performing an analysis of human and social, legaland bioethical reality (Romañach et al., 2009) as lived and perceived by people who arediscriminated on the grounds of functional diversity. Some of the diversity model key principles arenot found in the complementary philosophical proposals that will be described later in this text, andwill therefore provide new contributions to the diversity ethics proposal. The key principlesestablishedin the model are:

Functional diversity is part of human diversity

Diversity is inherent in humanity and it enriches our society

Society should respect and provide full dignity for all human diversity

To achieve full dignity for all human diversity society should:

Give the same value to the lives of all human beings

Respect the rights of all persons

The model relies on mutual recognition, as both the value of life and rights are “given” bysociety, but it also relies on self-recognition; on self-diversity and self-recognition of fragility for allhuman beings, and humanism.

Together with the feminine approach to ethics, known as “care ethics” (Noddings, 1984), thediversity model also contributes to provide a new ethical approach to different human realities andchallenges such as the “inDependency” or care situations. Care ethics diminishes the traditionalasymmetry between the functional diverse people and the rest of society, as it proposes a doubleway relation between subjects: “Clearly, the cared-for depends upon the one-caring. But theone caring is also oddly dependent upon the cared for.” (Noddings, 1984, 48). In this way a newinterdependency is proposed, that shortens distance between all humans, including in a way a lessunequal status for functional diversity. Nevertheless, it should be pointed out that care ethics neverincluded functional diversity (Arnau Ripollés, 2009).

Furthermore, diversity model has been used to question the sufficiency of contemporarytheoretical models(13)such as Rawls’ Theory of Justice(14) and Nussbaum’s Capabilities approach(Nussbaum, 2006).

4. Facing the challenge of extending the diversity theoretical framework

All different theoretical approaches to diversity reach a point in which other diversities must beconsidered, as a complex human reality within each one of them.

“Contemporary challenges for modern moral reasoning from a number of perspectiveshave lead to a recognition that moral claims are made within the social world moralmultiplicity. This world is marked by diversity and complexity-diversity created bydifferences within and among persons and a correlative complexity created by multiple crisscrossingour relations and resulting contradictions. Challenges to moral reasoning havealso initiated a passionate debate as to whether morality can be sustained at all in the faceof moral diversity.” (Jakobsen, 1998, 4).

Thus different diversities from within feminists have raised different moral approaches:

“These challenges come from a variety of movements which have articulated«ifferent"moral voices-feminist, womanist, mujérista, and lesbian to name a few (Gilligan 1982,Cannon 1988, Isasi-Díaz 1993, Hoaglnd 1988) - as well as from post-modern critiques ofmodern conceptions of subjectivity and agency (Benhabib et al. 1995). The relationshipsamong and between these various perspectives on their critiques are hotly debated. Forexample, Mohanty (1994, 163, fn 4) reads the “earlier political analysis of Third Worldfeminists” as “prefiguring” post-modern to modern assumption of unity, whileLugones(1994) reads the two sites producing different types of analysis. Lugones argues that "post-modern literature… goes against a politics of identity and toward minimizing thepolitical significance of groups”; while her position, one of which can also be seen in “theliterature on mestizaje, affirms a complex version of identity politics and a complexconception of groups” (475).” (Jakobsen, 1998, 4, footnote 7).

These different voices have mainly raised within a certain oppressed or conflict group,maintaining moral issues around the singularity of the group, defined by a pre-establishedborderline with the rest of society.

To overcome that limitation, moral philosophers like Axel Honneth and Nancy Fraser havedeveloped new broader moral approaches that intend to establish common grounds and proposals inmutual recognition and redistribution theory, incorporating all diversities. Unfortunately, nowadaysthis approach does not include functional diversity.

4.1 Mutual recognition and redistribution

The insufficiency of a single approach to face moral challenges for society, demands a morecomplex method. As described Honneth and Fraser social movements are nowadays facing thechallenge of integrating redistribution and recognition:

“Within social movements such as feminism, for example, activist tendencies that look toredistribution as the remedy for male domination are increasingly dissociated from tendenciesthat look instead to recognition of gender difference.” (Fraser - Honneth, 2003, 8).

Both authors consider redistribution and recognition as key issues in future diversity ethics.Redistribution’s origins can be found in the liberal tradition, especially its late XXth century. It wasin the latter part of the century, when it was richly expanded by philosophers such as John Rawlsand Ronald Dworkin, in their theories of distributive justice. They tried to synthesize the traditionalliberal emphasis on individual liberty with the egalitarianism of social democracy, proposing newconceptions of justice that could justify socio-economic redistribution.

Insufficiency of Rawls’ “Theory of justice” to address functional diversity has already beenpointed out by Martha Nussbaum. Starting from Scanlon’s proposals Nussbaum states that: “Eitherwe persist in our pursuit of the contract doctrine, and say that the contracting parties are alsotrustees for those who are incapable of participating; or we may say that the contract doctrine offersan account of only one type of morality: we need a different account to cope with the facts ofextreme dependency.” (Nussbaum, 2006, 136).

In order to solve that issue, Martha Nussbaum, following Eva Kittay and Amartya Sen tried toinclude functional diversity in these contractualist theories, and proposed the capabilities approach,closely linked to human rights (Nussbaum, 2006, 150). Nussbaum proposal goes beyond Rawlstheory of justice, and proposes some reformulations, based on Kittay’s and Sen’s ideas, and a list often items that would guarantee functional diverse people dignity, and define a basic social justice(Nussbaum, 2006, 76).

Nussbaum’s Capabilities approach is a solid step to include functional diversity in moralphilosophy, nevertheless, the analysis performed from the diversity approach has already stated theinsufficiency of her approach in this respect, as “…her approach to support intrinsic or moraldignity is not solid or consistent, as she mixes medical model’s thesis, and considers the cure offunctional diversity as a moral obligation of a just society, emphasizing the medical aspects of theperson must be repaired so that you can access the list of "capabilities"” (Romañach, 2009, 36).

This approach would then exclude some human beings that would have to be “repaired” to haveaccess to the capabilities list, giving less value to those person’s lives.Furthermore, even if conflicts over interests were justly adjudicated, society would remainnormatively deficient while its members are systematically denied the recognition they deserve.

And this recognition is not just an unmet courtesy that people need.Recognition designates a relation that structures and constitutes self-identity asauto consciousnessand reciprocal relation between subjects in which each sees the other as its equal butas separate. One becomes an individual subject only in virtue of recognizing and being recognizedby another subject. Therefore, recognition implies the Hegelian thesis that social relations are priorto individuals, and that intersubjectivity is prior to subjectivity. Recognition theory is currentlyundergoing a renaissance, as neo-Hegelian philosophers such as Charles Taylor and Axel Honnethare making it a central issue in their politics of difference. In fact, recognition “is proving central toefforts to conceptualize today’s tools for over identity and difference. Whether the issue is anindigenous land claims or women’s keyword, homosexual marriage or Muslim headscarves, moralphilosophers increasingly use the term "recognition" to unpack the normative basis of politicalclaims. They find that a category that conditions subjects’ autonomy on intersubjective regard wellcaptures the moral stakes of many contemporary conflicts.” (Fraser and Honneth, 2003, 1).

Gender, religion, culture, race and sexual orientation are taken in account by recognitionphilosophers but, functional diversity is consistently omitted as part of diversity, or as a part of theconflict between human identity and human difference.

Despite this omission, recognition can be thought as a fundamental part of future diversity ethictheories, as it has no specific mention to functional diversity exclusion. Some concepts like dignity,which is a centerpiece in the diversity approach, and many other aspects of functional diversitystruggle, like emancipation and inviolability of physical integrity, can also be found in recognitiontheories.

However, it is the combination of both recognition and redistribution that is now understood asthe path to follow to achieve justice, as it has been pointed out by modern authors working onrecognition:

“As social struggles of the last few decades have made clear, justice demands more than fairdistribution of material goods.”… “Regularly, members of marginalized and subaltern groupshave been systematically denied recognition for the worth of their culture and way of life, thedignity of their status as persons, and the inviolability of their physical integrity. Moststrikingly in the politics of identity, their struggles for recognition have come to dominate thepolitical landscape. Consequently, if social theory is to provide an adequate account of actualfields of social conflict, it to us for both to situate the motivation for these emancipatorystruggles within the social world and provide an account of what justifies them.” (Honneth,1996, x).

As for today, the relation between recognition and redistribution theories and functional diversitycan be resumed in the following terms: recognition does not explicitly exclude functional diversity,but it does not include functional diversity as any other diversity yet; and redistribution has provento be insufficient to provide sound moral founding for this group of people.(15)

Thus, we will propose an extension of this recognition and redistribution theories that wouldinclude the diversity approach, contributing to the construction of a wider and more solid model. Itwould include functional diversity’s issues – that affect about a 10% of the population. It wouldprovide more equality and diminish discrimination, even perhaps erase it. This model would alsoprovide theoretical grounds to deal with bioethical issues. We propose to name this new approach as“Ethics of diversity”.

4.2 Self-respect. Fundamental social achievements approach.

On the process of extending the theoretical framework, it is important to include a concept anddemand from the functional diversity social movements, that has not been considered before:self-respect(16).This concept is considered essential not only for functional diverse people, as the need for self-respect and self-esteem in diversity:

"Painful feelings and unhappiness resulting from a lack of self-esteem, can therefore bea legitimate focus of social attention. In some cases, it is clear that the fact of being unhappyis a legitimate cause of social concern, regardless of how it occurred (which explains theexistence, in France, for example, of Centers of Clinical psychotherapy). At the very least, itseems crucial to identify appropriate social measures that will contribute by redistributivechannels, to guarantee a minimum of individual and social achievements that would feed,positively, everyone’s self-respect. The fundamental concern of social achievements, discussedhere in a broad outline, demands that institutions and social policies take in account agents’and, indirectly, their achievements in private spheres. These compensation measures willfocus on individual achievements or results in their social dimension, assuming thatindividuals take responsibility for their private accomplishments. Unlike attention exclusivelyfocused on opportunities or capabilities, the approach based on fundamental socialachievements is concerned with distribution lots, once individual achievements have beencompleted, that is to say at the end of redistribution. In that way, it rejects the notion ofresponsibility provides sufficient justification for existing social inequalities or the situation ofpoor people considered "undeserving" and most disadvantaged. It finally offers a way toreconcile the desire for redistribution and recognition.” (Guibet Lafaye, 2007).

For the approach based on fundamental social achievements, equality for the poor should bemeasured at the end of the redistribution process, including social self-respect. But recognitionwould not suffice to grant this issue. This same approach can be extended to any diversity thatrequires both recognition and redistribution, as indigenous, functionally diverse people, migrants,etc.

5. Towards a new diversity ethics approach

Constructing ethics of diversity should be done in an open collaborative way, with a constanteffort to include new foundations and ideas that would lead to the same goal: a future society inwhich all human diversity is welcome and equality granted for all.

Some authors like Honneth and Fraser have started working under those premises, developing acommon framework that will assess diverging answers (Fraser and Honneth, 2003, 5), providing anstarting point that will incorporate fundamental pieces for diversity ethics. Nevertheless, the doorwill remain open for other ethical developments diversity ethics may include in its future evolutions.

5.1 Contributions of the diversity model or approach

As it has been explained, redistribution theories explicitly excluded functional diversity fromstart, and there have been attempts to make it fit within that framework, but those attempts havebeen analyzed and considered insufficient by the diversity approach. Although recognition theoriesdo not explicitly exclude functional diversity, they do not include functional diversity as any otherdiversity yet. Therefore, including functional diversity in these theories will add some pieces to thepuzzle contributing to build a stronger approach.

In first place, diversity approach can easily be extended to any human diversity: gender, sexualorientation, religion, race, age, etc. by just taking away the word “functional” from the firststatement of its premises (see section 3.1). The result would then be:

Diversity is inherent in humanity and it enriches our society

Society should respect and provide full dignity for all human diversity

To achieve full dignity for all human diversity society should:

Give the same value to the lives of all human beings

Respect the rights of all persons

Dignity, understood as giving the same value to all human beings, and same rights to all persons,would become a center piece of recognition and distribution, and would explicitly mean same valuefor human lives and same rights for all persons.

On the other hand, the diversity approach is built from the most fragile situation of any humanbeing, making human fragility another fundamental founding of this new ethic approach. Anyhuman being is bound to contingency, and is consequently a potential candidate for this type ofdiversity, as accidents happen through life than can put any one in that situation. Furthermore,functional diversity is unconsciously desired by all who want to live a long life, as statistics showthat it is inherent to the process of ageing.

This makes functional diversity not only a recognition issue, but also a self-recognition issue. Itmay be not that frequent for humans to, voluntarily or involuntarily, change race, gender, culture,sexual orientation or religion, but no one can be sure today of what will happen to him or herselftomorrow, thus all humans are potential candidates for functional diversity. What is missing is justawareness of this fragility. In fact, awareness of the functional diversity we all had when we werebabies.

This lack of awareness is not casual but it is a consequence of domination logics: “functionallydiverse people embody domination logics through an specific habitus (Bourdieu, 1991) in whichgood, beautiful and healthy normative is registered; on the other hand, the body is central toregulatory and political control issues that come from Bio-politics and Normalization Technologies(Foucault, 1992; 1998).” (Romañach et al., 2009).

The diversity model states that nowadays society provides no equality in functional diversity(Palacios and Romañach, 2006, 65-98), that moral issues have consequences in the future society,and that a choice must be done today on two types of future social construction: a nondiscriminatorysociety built to include the fragility derived from functional diversity, or adiscriminatory society constructed only for useful “normal” persons, in which fragility would beconsidered a human flaw. The diversity model also warns that “normality” is a social constructionand domination logics consequence, not a biological question.

The diversity approach naturally fits under Hegelian human recognition, that we can find inHonneth’s thesis, where recognition is prior to redistribution, as human beings should firstrecognize their own fragility and diversity and then select redistribution as an essential tool to grantjustice and rights. And with those rights and adequate resources, an easy path to enjoy self-respectwould be established.In the same way society accepts new-born’s fragility and provides redistribution to bear a childwhile his or her fragility is assumed, this concept should naturally expand to all society, all ages andall fragility derived from human diversity. And, as indicated before, this redistribution should bemeasured at the end of the process, evaluating individually achieved social self-respect and selfesteem.

5.2 Fitting all pieces

The new ethics of diversity recognition would rely then on breaking domination logics to obtaina basic human recognition of self reality and humanity. That humanity would inherently includeself-diversity, which would incorporate human fragility as a starting point of social progress. As aconsequence, redistribution theories, following the social achievements approach and policies,should be developed to guarantee justice and diversity social support, because diversity and fragilityof other human beings would become recognized in ourselves.

In order to be coherent with that diversity recognition, society should give all human lives thesame values and provide all persons with the same rights in a struggle for a future society in whichall diversities would be celebrated and supported(17).

With this new ethics of diversity, foundations for bioethical issues, specially those related withfunctional diversity, would be part of a new extension of recognition and redistribution theories.

6. Confronting diversity ethics with Peter Singers ethics.

Once the main structure of the diversity model has been established, we are ready to confront itwith Singer’s ethical arguments to prove its strength. We will do this in two steps. First we willpoint out incoherencies, contradictions and wrong assumptions in his ethics. Then we will comparediversity ethics bioethical positions with Singers’ opinions, and point out the different futuresocieties both positions may lead to.

6.1 Peter Singer and the moral status of nonhuman beings

6.1.1 The moral community: from description to evaluation

The thesis defended by Peter Singer is quite original in moral philosophy as it suggests extendingthe limits of the moral community to ontic entities – which, until now, have been excluded – and toexclude others which were undoubtedly considered part of it. For Singer, it is about adopting aperspective that definitively breaks with the classical humanism, on behalf of animal respect:

“Many authors challenged humanism, that is, the doctrine that all and only human liveshave an equal, absolute value (Glover 1977; Tooley 1983; Rachels 1986; Kuhse 1997). Thehumanistic view has two sides: an inclusive one which grants privileged moral status to allhumans, and an exclusive one which grants that status only to humans. By emphasizing themoral irrelevance of the species membership, and by arguing that, for example, the embryo,the fetus, of the comatose are not humans in the evaluative sense, those authors underminethe inclusive side of humanism and, accordingly, the traditional notion of moral community.This naturally furthered the revision of the moral status of nonhumans which, through itscriticism of the exclusive side of humanism, the ethics of animal liberation was pursuing.”(Singer, 2002, 131)(18).

The evaluative perspective - rather than descriptive - that P. Singer proposes over the moralcommunity places its core in the criteria of rationality, autonomy and self-consciousness (Singer,1993, p. 188). These criteria for assessing humanity should replace the simple reference to thebiological species. The membership of the moral community would no longer have ontic basis (i.e.linked to the specie) but would be based on “ability”. According to Singer, what is important is notwhether a life is human or nonhuman; rather, what is of central importance from an ethicalperspective what interests and capacities this being has. Based on the principle of the equalconsideration of interests, Singer argues against the privileged status of humans and theconventional assumption that we are, simply because we are human.

The consequence of P. Singer’s dual perspective - descriptive and evaluative - taken on humanentities consists in the exclusion of some of them, especially “embryos, fetus or comatoseindividual [which] are not human in the evaluative sense” (Singer, 2002, 131), and newborns with“incurable medical condition” (Singer, 2002, 284). This redefinition of the limits of the moralcommunity is inseparable from a reinterpretation of the frontiers of humanity and of what is worthyor not to be recognized as human. The question then is:

“Political philosophy seems to see the concept of person unproblematic. This is not so inbioethics. Though the word "person" is, in current use, often used as if it meant the same as"human being," the terms are generally not seen as equivalent in bioethical discussions. Mostauthors in fact use "person" to refer in an unambiguous way to the second of the alreadymentioned senses of the word "human," that is, the philosophical sense of possessing certaincharacteristics like self-awareness and rationality; this is distinct from the biological sense of"human," meaning belonging to the species Homo sapiens.” (Singer, 2002, 133).

In fact, “a distinction is often made between two uses of "person," the descriptive (also sometimeslabeled as metaphysical) and the normative (or moral). On this view, to say of some being that sheis a person in the descriptive sense is to cover some information about what the being is like, andthis can amount to saying that she has characteristics a, b, c; on the other hand to use the term"person" in a normative way is to use it simply to ascribe moral properties - usually some rights orduties, and frequently the right to life - for being so denominated (Feinberg 1980).” (Singer, 2002,133).

Nevertheless, this position is far from unanimity. Concerning the embryo status, the failure toreach agreement on this debate has been raised by Habermas:

“Despite these differences, there is something we can learn from the abortion debate, adebate that has seriously been sustained for decades; the failure of all attempts to arrive at aneutral cosmovisional description (i.e. not prejudiced) moral status of nascent human life, adescription that is acceptable to all citizens of a secular society. One part describes theembryo in early development stage as a "bunch of cells," in contraposition to the person ofthe newborn, to whom human dignity corresponds in a strict moral sense. The other partconsiders the fertilization of human egg relevant as the beginning of a process ofdevelopment as an individual governed by itself. Seeing things in this way, all biologicallydeterminable specimen as belonging to the species must be considered as a potential personand bearer of fundamental rights.” (Habermas, 2002, 48).

This raises two irreconcilable visions of a “person” whose use as the foundation of dignity.

Actually:

“found[ing] the dignity of man on the notion of person is doubly problematic. First, theconcept of "person" states a dignity that is not characteristic of men. This concept alsoapplies to God and the angels (if any), other non-human rational beings and even animalspossess self-awareness. Secondly, this dignity does not extend to all men: the embryos,newborns, the comatose human beings, certain types of functional diversity (handicap)mental, etc. are excluded because they do not exhibit the characteristics of the "person».” (Bouriau, 2007, 11-12).

Peter Singer proposes a reformulation of this issue from a different moral perspective, that is, notin ontic or species terms, (i.e. refering to the specie) but in ethical terms:

“…a question about which only a few philosophers have appreciated that the crucial issueis not as many people assume, "When does the fetus become a human being?", but rather"What are the characteristics of a being that make it wrong to kill that being?”. It is by nomeans obvious that being a member of the Homo sapiens species is what counts on thesecond question. Sentience or even a certain measure of self-awareness might be moreappropriate characteristics to choose.” (Singer, 2002, 61).

This new determination of the moral community borders, and of whom might deserve respect –i.e. not being annihilated– means that killing someone with “sensibility or even a certain dose ofauto-consciousness” would be a crime. That includes some animals and, from this point of view, itwould not include certain Homo Sapiens beings. This is a central point on his thesis to support theidea that some animals should not be killed, while some traditionally considered humans can.

6.1.2 Aporia and counterfactuality of a position called pragmatic

Thus, this redefinition of the contours of the moral community - that imposes moral obligationsregarding those who are included - is supposed to provide answers to delicate situations that arefrequently considered to be associated with forms of life that deviate from what is recognized as thestandard. Therefore:

“In the case of defective infants, however, replacement could be a desirable option.Suppose that a couple plans to have two children. The first child is normal but the second isdiagnosed immediately after birth as a sever case of spina bifida. If it lives, the child willgrow up paralyzed from the waist down, incontinent and mentally retarded – though hemight, for all that, have a tolerable pleasant existance, if it is intensively cared for. Supposethe couple do not wish to give the child up to an institution, fearing that it might not receivethe best care there. Yet they are equally unhappy at the prospect of trying to bring up such achild. They still want two normal children. They feel that with the burden of a handicappedas well as a normal child to bring up, however, they cannot have another child. Thereplaceability principle would allow them to kill the defective infant and then go ahead withanother pregnancy.” (Singer, 2002, 120)(19).

As stated, he considers that certain humans could easily be replaced, because in that way wewould spare them and their relatives a miserable live, reviewing the idea of equality. That allowshim to suggest:

“I wanted to point out that the only logical alternative – to do anything possible topreserve life at any cost – was extremely cruel in those cases where the only prospect wasmonths of suffering before a premature death. A decision not to do everything possible topreserve life, on the other hand, already involves an implicit judgment that the quality ofthat life is so poor that it is not worth prolonging it - in other words, a judgment that somelives are not worth living. Once such decision had been taken, it might be kinder to takeactive steps to end that life quickly, rather than to allow an infant to die from dehydration, orfrom an infection.” (Singer, 2002, 69).

P. Singer’s ontological proposition has therefore consequences and a moral impact, as he judgesirresponsible to contribute to preseveration of a being in this type of existence (“It does not seemquite wise to increase any further draining of limited resources by increasing the number of childrenwith impairments.”(20), particularly on the basis of a reference to the quality of life – a concept hardto evaluate as it might be subjective and controversial (Fagot-Largeault 1991; Guibet Lafaye2009b). In short, there would be a moral duty to end, or to prevent the survival of a human being“paralyzed from chest down” and “incontinent”, even when that human can live perfectly well innowadays society. Actually, that is the case of one of the authors of this text. This position shouldtherefore face many objections.

In first place, this moral duty is introduced by a logical error included in the reasoning proposedby Singer. Indeed if you replace a human being with another to be born, who will not be the samehuman being, but a different one (see Guibet Lafaye, 2009c). The logical error sometimes comes inthe form of medical inaccuracy, because the proposed description of a condition such as spinabifida refers to its most advanced form, is not correct all cases. This is particularly true when Singerdiscusses the tendency of being mentally retarded. On the issue of being “mentally retarded”, PeterSinger makes another mistake, as spina bifida does not necessarily lead to that “retardation”(21).In second place, Peter Singer tends to assume what it is called the medical model of functionaldiversity, that is, to consider a human being just by its biological or medical description. As aconsequence he questions:

“But how do we square this view with our intuitions about the reverse case, when a coupleare considering having a child who, perhaps because it will inherit a genetic defect, wouldlead a thoroughly miserable life and die before its second birthday?” (Singer, 2002, 115).

In fact the same individual can be defined in different ways. If we use a medical model definitionone would be a “spine core injured person, incontinent, spastic, paralyzed from chest down, withdexterity problems in upper limbs, etc.” But the same individual can also be described as a“computer scientist, social activist and writer, bioethics expert, friend of his friends, lover of hisfamily, etc.”. These are not divergent descriptions of an individual reality which is nothing to saythat one is more real or relevant than the other. These two descriptions are equally true. Stressingthe first one is, in fact, motivated by the projection on ignored situations - because they are not livedin first person – of presumed sufferance.(22) The prevalence of the first description is motivated by anaversion to sufferance that is widely shared by common sense.

Finally the theoretical position defended by P. Singer will highlight a specific feature in bioethicsand medical ethics discourse and reflection, that gives a central role to the experience in first person- in this case an argument of last resort - that is not recognized in other forms of normativeelaboration or analysis principles in the philosophical discourse. Even if such an argument doeshave an impact on the evolution of normative debate in the public sphere, it cannot become a centralmoral argument, insofar as personal experience can influence the reflection both in one directionand in the opposite (see the sharing of individual experiences in the bioethics États Généraux inFrance, 2009). At a first level of analysis this can be observed in the contrast between the P.Singer’s experience, and the experience of one of the authors of this text, who was R&D computerscience researcher and a “first-class” citizen when at the age of 28 he had a motorcycle accident,and now lives with a quadriplegia that was the outcome of the accident.

Had this author read Peter Singer’s thesis before the accident, he would have probably agreedwith them. Furthermore he has publicly stated that before the accident “he would have preferred tobe dead rather than live in a wheelchair”.(23) A similar change of position was assumed by P. Singer.In fact, this is a similar but more extended experience as the one Peter Singer lived “when (insteadof doing what his critics said his philosophy would demand), he did not kill his mother, who hadadvanced Alzheimer’s disease and whose care was consuming money that could, those critics said,more profitable be spent elsewhere.” (Singer, 2002, 11). No matter how coherent P. Singer’sposition from a principles analysis is, its limits must be admitted, as his ethics should become amodel for action.

Furthermore the consequence of accepting that “ability” as the relevant issue to consider a beingas part of the moral community is that:

“If we were to encounter alien beings from another planet, something that looks likegreen slime but engages in complex behaviours, we would not be justified in failing toextend respectful treatment to the aliens merely on the ground that they belong to anotherspecies. If they proved to be like humans in morally relevant respects, then they should betreated the same as humans. Very roughly speaking, if the aliens showed a capacity forrational, autonomous agency, we would be required to include them within the scope of ourmoral principles.” (Arneson, 1998).

If we accept Singer’s ethics “the problem is to specify moral principles that yield intuitivelysatisfactory implications for the treatment of human individuals and other individual animals giventhat cognitive capacities differ across species and individuals.” (Arneson, 1998). That is to say, itwould be very hard to obtain moral grounds for equality, non discrimination and justice.

Singer is also incoherent when he confronts presupposed sufferance of animals and functionallydiverse humans, as he concedes the benefit of doubt to animals: “On the other hand, it is difficult toestablish that an animal has not will to live, and even in the case of the hen there might be enoughreasons to think if it would not be best to concede the benefit of doubt”.

But when it comes to what he considers not to be humans, or what he considers to be replaceablehumans, prudence and benefit of doubt disappear: “I wanted to make clear that the only logicalalternative - insisting in preserving that live at all cost-was extremely cruel for the kid in those casesin which these only perspective was of months of sufferance before a premature death.” (Singer,2002, 95). And his incoherent attitude to concede benefit of doubt is not based in scientificevidence, but on his own subjective perspective.

6.2 Bioethical responses to Peter Singer’s thesis

Once diversity ethics is constructed including all pieces as previously described, some bioethicalpositions have already been developed from one of its parts, the diversity approach. The ethics ofdiversity legitimates a future society in which recognition of all human diversity and fragility wouldbe granted. In order to sustain that guarantee all human lives would be valued as equal.

Human lives equal value would then give support to consistent and coherent bioethics positionssuch as the following. Concerning research on humans, “it should not be allowed to investigate inhumans who do not give their consent” (Romañach, 2009, 204-205), always, because consent, i.e.individual personal consent, is the only guarantee we have for equality, and consent provided byothers (e.g. by tutors), has historically proved not to be always in the best interest of the individualwhose consent has been overtaken. Furthermore, experience shows that overriding consent inhistory has lead to unequal societies. Following that argument, sterilization of functionally diversepeople should be banned for the future.

Concerning new genetics, although they can be used in a positive way, the way we’re facing andusing them today means “undermining the normative autocomprehension of people that guide theirown lives and show respect for each other” (Habermas, 2002, 45), a threat to diversity, speciallyfunctional diversity(24) and a new subtle form of eugenics (Romañach, 2009, 159).

Eugenics can also be detected in modern abortion laws(25), embryo selection, sterilization andinfanticide. Diversity ethics clearly states that “selecting an embryo means a genetic selection undermajor cultural patterns, and is therefore eugenics, in the same it is considered to be eugenicsinfanticideon the grounds of functional diversity, and that eugenics means giving a different valueto the lives of functionally diverse and therefore a decrease of their full dignity” (Romañach, 2009,204-205); and that “today eugenic practices occur through abortion, genetic selection andsterilization, that the door to a death in dignity should be opened when conditions exist to ensurefull dignity in functional diversity”.

Furthermore past eugenics practices and experiences prove that accepting eugenics in a societyhas lead to unequal societies, and they should be not be allowed any further (Evans, 2004).

Therefore, ethics on diversity would frontally confront all Singer’s thesis in ethical andbioethical issues related to functional diversity, on the grounds of a solid and coherent ethicalapproach, and a moral community definition that should be considered if a future society in whichall humans would be accepted in equal terms and social justice is desired.

7. Conclusions

Our aim in this article is to propose a solid powerful extension of recognition and redistributionethics: diversity ethics. These ethics reinforce prior approaches due to the inclusion of functionaldiversity as part of human diversity to be accounted for in moral philosophy, the need to breaksocial domination logics, and to analyze redistribution at the end of the process, to ensure it willaccount for self-respect and self-esteem, another forgotten issue in diversity.

The inclusion of functional diversity in recognition and redistribution ethics proposes the idea ofauto-recognition of fragility and diversity in all humans, as we’re all functionally diverse and riskpersonal discrimination on those grounds. Furthermore, a pragmatic approach of dignity, based ongiving the same value for all human lives, is included in diversity ethics, providing tools to facebioethical challenges.

Diversity ethics is proposed as a choice for the future society, as we are to choose now whetherin the future we will live in a non-discriminatory society in which all human diversity is welcomeand every individual regardless of her or his differences, abilities and productivity has a chance tolive and enjoy life at any age; or we will live in a society in which not all diversity is accepted, adiscriminatory society in which only people who are useful, capable, smart, skilled, with good sightand hearing, etc. will be welcome and allowed to live and enjoy what society provides.

Making a clear choice of the first option, diversity ethics has been confronted with P. Singer’sethics, that have chosen the second option, showing their weakness and incoherencies. Alternativebioethical positions have also been exposed, that are coherent with the choice of a future society inwhich all humans will have the right to justice and equality, as we need a society different from theone we have today, a society in which inequalities are reproduced through generations.

Notes

1 Note on language use. Authors usually write articles and use bibliography in their native languages: French andSpanish. Therefore translated versions of bibliography and texts may be found in this article.

2 The term “functional diversity” as a substitute of “disability” was first proposed by Romañach and Lobato, (2005) andit is a part of the diversity model (Palacios and Romañach, 2006, 2007). It should be noted that it is the first nonnegativedescription on this reality that evades the ability concept.

3 According to Synopsis and classification of living about 1.4 million living species of all kinds of organisms have beendescribed.

4 Nevertheless, the will to defend a minority group does not necessarily lead to biased and unilateral proposals,focused exclusively on the rights or interests of particular groups, but it is also useful to develop comprehensiveconceptual approaches that would consider each minority group in its specificity and diversity.

5 Recently, some Spanish and Argentinean sociologists have also developed work in this field (see Romañach et al.,2009).

6 There is only a Spanish version, as the book has not yet been translated to English (Romañach, 2009).

7 The social model ideas have also been included in the UN Convention of the rights of persons with disabilities.UNITED NATIONS (2006). “Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities”

8 A 10% of the population is discriminated on the grounds of functional diversity.

9 To read about a modern reflection about happiness see: Guibet Lafaye (2009a).

10 The pragmatic approach to the dignity concept in the diversity model was performed after analyzing severalinternational documents related with bioethics and human rights and performing a semantic distillation of what it meantin those documents.

11 It should be noted that many approaches on the field (e.g. Nussbaum Capabilities model) have been proposed bypeople who do not live that reality daily.

12 As pointed out by Foucault (1992, 1998).

13 See Romañach (2009, 23-28) and Guzmán, Romañach and Toboso (2009).

14 Rawls, 1971, tr. sp., 51.

16 This concept is considered essential not only for functional diverse people, as the need forself-respect and self-esteem in diversity:

15 Furthermore, moral philosophy does not often deal with bioethics challenges such as genetic selection, abortion,medical research, embryo moral status, etc. These are crucial issues for functional diversity, as functionally diversepeople feel threatened by some experts’ positions and practices in those fields, that include Peter Singer: “We arethreatened when Peter Singer, a professor of bioethics, writes: "It does not seem quite wise to increase any furtherdraining of limited resources by increasing the number of children with impairments. ” (DISABLED PEOPLEINTERNATIONAL EUROPE (DPI), 2000).

16 As stated in the Independent Living philosophy: “Independent Living is a philosophy and a movement of people withdisabilities who work for self-determination, equal opportunities and self-respect”.

17 In the way outlined by Galston (1995).

18 This ambition of animal condition liberation had already been adopted in the past: “But is there any reason whywe should be suffered to torment them?. Not that I can see.” ….“The day may come when the rest of the animal creationmay acquire those right which never could have been witholden from them but by the hand of tyranny.” (Bentham,1780, 235).

19 Before starting the analysis, it should be noted that P. Singer commits a fallacy, since he draws a conclusion notrelated to the initial premise of his reasoning, but a term he introduced after the exposure of the situation initiallydescribed.

20 DISABLED PEOPLE INTERNATIONAL EUROPE (2000).

21 Moreover “retarded” constitutes a normative description that corresponds to a value given to a certain mind in a giventime, comparing it to other minds. But anyone’s mind is different from the others, and drawing the line between what isretarded, and what is not, is a social issue, not a biological issue.

22 Concerning the issues on sufferance and lifes not worth to be lived see: Romañach, 2009, 65-81.

23 Romañach, 2009, 58, footnote 70. The role of experience in first person as an argument of last resort, is confirmedby the normative changes induced to end-of-life requests of Vincent Humbert in France, or Ramon Sampedro in Spain.For a reverse view on Sampedro’s case see Romañach, 2005

24 DISABLED PEOPLE INTERNATIONAL EUROPE (2000).

25 Spain approved in 2010 a new abortion law that maintains the eugenic abortion.

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